Horses get first feel for new Del Mar surface

DEL MAR, Calif – Eddie Truman is always one of the first trainers to arrive here at Del Mar every summer, and he couldn’t wait for Friday, when horses were allowed on the track for the first time after being allowed into the stable area Thursday. So eager was Truman that he joked, “I brought bolt cutters just in case” he couldn’t get in.

He wasn’t alone in his desire to be here. The first day of training is usually a sleepy one, but there were a few hundred horses already on the grounds Friday, with Truman joined by the likes of trainers Dan Blacker, Michael McCarthy, and George Papaprodromou, who all shipped in horses Thursday.

“I’m marking my territory like a pit bull,” McCarthy said. “I wanted to get situated before it becomes a madhouse.”

The stable area opened just four days after the San Diego County Fair ended its run on the grounds here, with horses replacing the Tilt-A-Whirl and all manner of fried food products. Racing begins at Del Mar next Thursday, the start of a 40-day meeting that will last though Labor Day. Anticipation is high for this meet, with more than 2,000 horses expected to fill the barn area, and with an encouraging uptick in the numbers of 2-year-olds from years past.

The main track is now dirt, a change that was made over the winter after Del Mar decided last year to do away with the synthetic Polytrack surface that had been in place since 2007. The dirt is the same El Segundo sand that is in place at Santa Anita, so the hope is that the consistency of surfaces will be of benefit on the Southern California circuit.

“It’s the same surface,” Tom Robbins, vice president of racing at Del Mar, said Friday.

As a result, though, horses who had become bankable stars here every summer owing to Polytrack won’t have that same edge.

“It kind of throws a kink into the horses for courses,” Truman said.

But the positives, to Truman, outweigh the negatives.

“Hopefully, we’ll have a safe surface,” he said. “There’s consistency throughout now with Del Mar and Santa Anita. The track looks fantastic.

“When they had the 2-year-old sale here in May,” he said, referring to the Barretts sale, “they seemed to be getting over it really well.”

Truman was standing near where the six-furlong chute meets the main track, looking back toward the grandstand. It was a cool, overcast morning, with horses seemingly perking up in the ocean air. Trainers, too.

“It’s so great being down here,” Truman said.